Secret cities
Starke is a “community within a community” found in one of Florida’s most dangerous prison regions.
“It looks like your normal neighborhood, but you won’t find this place on any map. The county property appraiser doesn’t even have a record of it. In this secret community, some streets have names, others do not. When we plugged in one street name, mapquest said it doesn’t exist. The Department of Corrections says this community is staff housing for the prisons. There are 134 homes, 87 mobile homes and 52 apartments. The rent starts at $50 a month. The lawns are personally cut by the prisoners…In some cases, taxpayers pay for the water and electricity…[But] there’s no way to know exactly who lives in each house or how long they have lived there. Again–there is no paper trail because these homes don’t exist in public records…” (watch the video)